I guess training your back is still the long forgotten art. I have been keeping track of the people that have did a freeweight or bodyweight back exercise in the gym in the past three days and I have to say I could count them on my fingers (for the record I have 5 fingers on each hand).

Everyone is still on the "mirror muscles" program and asking me why they have hit a plateau. And let’s not mention the fact that the amount of pressing that is going on, is causing an imbalance in the body that already has a crappy posture. If you were perfectly balanced (nowadays very rare) you should be doing a 1:1 ratio of pulling and pushing exercises. Considering that the posture of the average person is very messed up from leaning forward the whole day, it should be more like 2:1 or more for pulling compared to pushing.

 It also seems that people believe that having a sharp pain in the shoulder is just a part of lifting weights….and fighting through it makes you tough. The tough part is paying for shoulder surgery instead of training smart!

The point I am making is start training your back, actualy how about you start training all the muscles on the backside of your body, from your calves up to your neck, and see what will start happening: busting plateaus, better posture, a reason to dance when the "shake that ass" song comes on….

By the way, for all the athletes out there that want to get faster, at the football combines studies have showed that the fastest athletes also had the best relative strength when it came to doing chin ups/pull ups. Coincidence? I think not! Stop doing bench presses for a month and get your back stronger and let me know what happens to your performance.

 

Maybe you should do a couple more of these

Does no one want a "six pack" back?